I. Field
The present invention relates generally to communications, and more specifically to techniques for determining a distribution of a data stream to be transmitted via a multi-channel, e.g., a multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO), orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) communication system.
II. Background
In a wireless communication system, an RF modulated signal from a transmitter may reach a receiver via a number of propagation paths. The characteristics of the propagation paths typically vary over time due to a number of factors such as fading and multipath. To provide diversity against deleterious path effects and improve performance, multiple transmit and receive antennas may be used. If the propagation paths between the transmit and receive antennas are linearly independent (i.e., a transmission on one path is not formed as a linear combination of the transmissions on the other paths), which is generally true to at least an extent, then the likelihood of correctly receiving a data transmission increases as the number of antennas increases. Generally, diversity increases and performance improves as the number of transmit and receive antennas increases.
A multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) communication system employs multiple (NT) transmit antennas and multiple (NR) receive antennas for data transmission. A MIMO channel formed by the NT transmit and NR receive antennas may be decomposed into NS independent channels, with NS≦min {NT, NR}. Each of the NS independent channels may also be referred to as a spatial subchannel (or a transmission channel) of the MIMO channel and corresponds to a dimension. The MIMO system can provide improved performance (e.g., increased transmission capacity) if the additional dimensionalities created by the multiple transmit and receive antennas are utilized.
For a full-rank MIMO channel, where NS=NT≦NR, an independent data stream may be transmitted from each of the NT transmit antennas. The transmitted data streams may experience different channel conditions (e.g., different fading and multipath effects) and may achieve different signal-to-noise-and-interference ratios (SNRs) for a given amount of transmit power. Moreover, if successive interference cancellation processing is used at the receiver to recover the transmitted data streams (described below), then different SNRs may be achieved for the data streams depending on the specific order in which the data streams are recovered. Consequently, different data rates may be supported by different data streams, depending on their achieved SNRs. Since the channel conditions typically vary with time, the data rate supported by each data stream also varies with time.
The MIMO design has two modes of operation—the single code word (SCW) and multiple-code word (MCW).
In MCW mode, the transmitter can encode the data transmitted on each spatial layer independently, possibly with different rates. The receiver employs a successive interference cancellation (SIC) algorithm which works as follows: Decode the first layer, and then subtract its contribution from the received signal after re-encoding and multiplying the encoded first layer with an “estimated channel,” then decode the second layer and so on. This “onion-peeling” approach means that each successively decoded layer sees increasing signal-to-noise (SNR) and hence can support higher rates. In the absence of error-propagation, MCW design with SIC achieves capacity. The disadvantage of this design arise from the burden of “managing” the rates of each spatial later—(a) increased CQI feedback (one CQI for each layer); (b) increased ACK/NACK messaging (one for each layer); (c) complications in Hybrid ARQ (HARQ) since each layer can terminate at different transmissions; (d) performance sensitivity of SIC to channel estimation errors with increased Doppler, and/or low SNR; and (e) Increased decoding latency requirements since each successive layer cannot be decoded until prior layers are decoded.
In the conventional SCW mode design, the transmitter encodes the data transmitted on each spatial layer with “identical data rates.” The receiver can employ a low complexity linear receiver such as a Minimum Mean Square Solution (MMSE) or Zero Frequency (ZF) receiver, or non-linear receivers such as QRM, for each tone.
The SCW design overcomes the above mentioned implementation hassles of the MCW design. The drawback is that the SCW mode cannot support the MCW rates in spatially correlated channels or line-of-sight (LOS) channels with a high K-factor. Both of these scenarios lead to a loss in channel rank or increase in channel condition number and increased inter-layer interference. This dramatically lowers the effective SNR for each spatial layer. Hence, the data rate supported by each layer is lowered, which lowers the overall data rate.
K-factor is the ratio of the LOS channel power to the non-LOS channel power. Rank is the number of eigen-modes in the channel with non-zero energy. Condition Number is the ratio of the largest eigenvalue to the smallest eigen-value of the MIMO channel.
There is therefore a need in the art for techniques to distribute a data stream dynamically to be transmitted via a multi-channel, e.g., a multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO), orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) communication system.